impossible and you decided to leave him, and I spoke to you plainly for

the first time, and you did not say "No," but went away in tears--then I

was perfectly happy; and had I then been asked what more I wanted, I

should have answered "Nothing"! But later on, when there came the

possibility of uniting our lives: when my mother grew fond of you and

the possibility began to be realised; when you told me that you loved

and had loved me, and then (as you did just now) that he no longer

existed for you and that you love only me--what more, one would think,

could I wish for? But no! Now the past torments me! I wish that past had

not existed, and that there were nothing to remind me of it.

LISA [reproachfully] Victor!

KARÉNIN. Lisa, forgive me! If I tell you this, it is only because I

don't want a single thought of mine about you to be hidden from you. I

have purposely told you, to show how bad I am, and how well I know that

I must struggle with and conquer myself.... And now I've done it! I love

him.

LISA. That's as it should be. I did all I could, but it was not I that

did what you desired: it happened in my heart, from which everything but

you has vanished.

KARÉNIN. Everything?

LISA. Everything, everything--or I would not say so.

The Live Corpse